LUCY: Enjoyable mash-up of chaotic Creative Junk & high-on intellectual trash! [2.5/5]

Human Brain has endless possibilities and a kind of galaxy of information that make us better and more sensible than any other living souls on this planet. But if Newton could push his to unravel the mystery of gravity after the ‘apple’ effect or the Wright brothers could manage to pull out their aeronautical inventions; trust me, they all were using just 10% of their mind. Naturally, we the average people don’t even hit that level. Now think, if mere 10% can make someone a Newton or Leonardo Da Vinci or Aryabhatta, what magical excellence a 100% would produce? LUCY, I say and that’s the cynicism one develops while watching Luc Besson’s science-fiction thriller LUCY. Trying to sound multifaceted, intricate and advanced like THE TREE OF LIFE and look slick-pacy & pulsating as LA FEMME NIKITA, LUCY actually ends up in being not more than a chaotic creative junk mixed with high-on intellectual trash.

Lucy, played by the ever-startling Scarlett Johansson gets in trap of a Korean mob during an involuntary drug delivery mess. Soon, she finds herself as one of the human drug carriers with a pack of highly synthetic CPH4 powder positioned in their lower abdomen in a surgical operation. Much before she could be transported to her planned destination, an unwanted brawl lends her in a serious problem or magical transformation in disguise. The pack gets burst and now the invincible chemical reactions start stimulating human mental powers to reach its maximum. No wonder, Lucy is now a superwoman who needs to walk the path of retribution and revolution, later!

From the very speedy time-lapse shots to the earth evolution theory getting reproduced on screen with amazing visuals, LUCY at places looks a distant cousin to THE TREE OF LIFE, though the depth and connect go missing at large. But if it is not into its National Geographic Mode, it is sure a thriller that never loses the steam. Monologues by Morgan Freeman, playing a neurology expert scientist talking about magical capabilities of a human mind and how evolution can become revolution followed by the same getting applied on Lucy’s situation is nicely interwoven. With just a 90 minute of duration, this is in fact too much jam-packed in one box. Film doesn’t think much before slipping and swapping genres of all kinds. At one if it joins the league of science-fiction, minutes later you will find it covered as a regular Hollywood action-thriller. No wonder, you don’t really feel like connected to any.

Having said that, it is not an unwatchable film at all! Scarlett Johansson alone is capable of pulling it off for the most, her earlier performance in HER shouts out loud to prove the point. Morgan Freeman is as usual extremely sincere and charismatic, one of my favorites. Besides, the visual effects are never involved and incomprehensible like we see in most of Hollywood’s regular Friday flicks but simplified or I would say over-simplified. Film’s action sequences are average. Drama is almost overshadowed by the cerebral investigations and research theories. I doubt if even Luc Besson had his share of 10% implied on this film. This is not a piece of information you would like to keep in your mind but having a good time with it, is completely different. Watch out for Ms. Johansson! [2.5/5]